Monday, October 6, 2008

05 Oct 2008 06:40 pmDemocratic surrogates say they've been given the go-ahead from the Obama campaign to mention John McCain's associations with S&L kingpin Charles Keating and other historically tarnished creatures when asked about Obama's connection to ex-Weatherman William Ayers.

A senior Democrat who has had contact with Obama's high command points to Democratic strategist Paul Begala's comments on this morning's Meet the Press.

Begala noted that McCain once "sat on the board of a very right wing organization," the U.S. Council for World Freedom, led by a retired Army Maj. General named John Singlaub. The Anti-Defamation League allegedly called the CWF's parent organization a gathering place for racists and anti-Semites.

Said Begala: "Now, that's not John McCain. I don't think he is that. But, but, you know, the problem is that a lot of people know John McCain's record better than Governor Palin, and he does not want to play guilt by association or this thing could blow up in his face."

Other potential negative associations for McCain are his long-time South Carolina consultant, Richard Quinn, a publisher of a Southern heritage magazine, and John Hagee, a pastor whose endorsement McCain solicited and later rejected.

OBAMA PREPARED FOR MCCAIN TO GET DIRTY: {from Ron Chusid at Liberal Values}**Check out Obama camp's video at right.}**With McCain on the wrong side of the issues and trailing badly in the polls, he is prepared to go even more negative in the hopes of pulling out a victory in November. This will include raising Obama’s ties to Ayers and Rezko even though these smears have previously been debunked.

Having learned from seeing such attacks used against John Kerry, Obama is responding by launching a preemptive attack with this ad:

“Three quarters of a million jobs lost this year. Our financial system in turmoil. And John McCain? Erratic in a crisis. Out of touch on the economy. No wonder his campaign wants to change the subject.

“Turn the page on the financial crisis by launching dishonorable, dishonest ‘assaults’ against Barack Obama. Struggling families can’t turn the page on this economy, and we can’t afford another president who is this out of touch.”

In addition to the ad, Obama has given surrogates an ok to go after McCain for his association to Charles Keating and involvement in the Keating 5 Scandal. Marc Ambinder notes other associations which might be harmful to McCain:

A senior Democrat who has had contact with Obama’s high command points to Democratic strategist Paul Begala’s comments on this morning’s Meet the Press.

Begala noted that McCain once “sat on the board of a very right wing organization,” the U.S. Council for World Freedom, led by a retired Army Maj. General named John Singlaub. The Anti-Defamation League allegedly called the CWF’s parent organization a gathering place for racists and anti-Semites.

Said Begala: “Now, that’s not John McCain. I don’t think he is that. But, but, you know, the problem is that a lot of people know John McCain’s record better than Governor Palin, and he does not want to play guilt by association or this thing could blow up in his face.”

Other potential negative associations for McCain are his long-time South Carolina consultant, Richard Quinn, a publisher of a Southern heritage magazine, and John Hagee, a pastor whose endorsement McCain solicited and later rejected.

Obama is also counterattacking on the stump:

Sen. Barack Obama on Sunday charged that Sen. John McCain’s campaign is launching “Swift boat-style attacks” on him instead of addressing the country’s problems.

“Sen. McCain and his operatives are gambling that they can distract you with smears rather than talk to you about substance. They’d rather try to tear our campaign down than lift this country up,” Obama said at an event in Asheville, North Carolina.

“That’s what you do when you’re out of touch, out of ideas, and running out of time,” he said.

In return the Republicans are searching out yet more associations to use to smear Obama. Nate Silver compares this strategy to that of a football team which must resort to desperate measures despite the fact that odds are against them working:

It is a sad denouement for what was one to be a high-minded campaign focused around themes of honor and reform (themes that were resuscitated briefly during the Republican Convention), possibly accompanied by McCain’s taking a one-term pledge. It is also, however, Mr. McCain’s strategists would seem to have concluded, their only remaining hope.

I am not here to dispute that this is McCain’s best strategy — in the same way that an onside kick is a team’s best strategy when it trails late in the game with no timeouts left. But like the onside kick, it is fairly unlikely to work.

The problem for McCain is that resorting to this type of attack further damages the impression that McCain is different from other Republicans. Just as dirty attacks from Hillary Clinton backfired and helped Obama win the nomination, such dirty attacks from McCain will further demonstrate to voters that change is needed in politics, leading more independents to back Obama. Even Hillary Clinton was careful about using attacks based upon Rezko and Ayers, leaving much of this to the media. If less offensive attacks by Clinton backfired against her, there is a far greater chance that these attacks will harm McCain more than they will harm Obama.

Having announced to the media that this is his strategy will make it even more likely to succeed, and raises further questions as to the competence of McCain’s campaign. In recent years Republicans have been incompetent at governing but highly skilled at launching Swift Boat attacks. Currently McCain appears to be incompetent at both matters of public policy as well as at launching Republican smears despite turning to Karl Rove staffers.AND THERE'S MORE {from daily KOS}

From The Coors Connection by Russ Bellant

When the Reagan Administration began organizing the Nicaraguan Contras in 1981, allied but nominally private groups were formed to build support for the Contra plans.

One of those groups, formed shortly after the first Reagan inauguration, was the US Council for World Freedom, headed by Major General John Singlaub. The USCWF quickly became the US branch of the World Anti-Communist League. The USCWF began building support for the Reagan policy of aiding not only the Nicaraguan Contras but RENAMO and UNITA in southern Africa and rightist Islamic fundamentalists in Afghanistan. Singlaub informed CIA director William Casey and NSC staff of his actions and operated with their consent if not under their direct influence.

One of the early USCWF financial backers was Joe Coors, according to two former USCWF treasurers. Coors shared Reagan's enthusiasm for the Contras despite early indications of the unsavory background of certain Contra leaders and reliable reports of Contra acts of brutality. The Contras were originally known as the 15th of September Legion. Their earliest training came from Argentinean military intelligence, which ran death squads in that country and sponsored a Latin American conference of death squad leaders in 1980. That death squad network was also the Latin American branch on WACL. In 1982, Argentinean intelligence worked with Moon's Unification Church and fugitive Nazi Klaus Barbie to establish a Nazi-style state in Bolivia.

Honestly, if they try to hang Ayers around Obama, McCain, true or not, has a history of associating with ultra-right wing racists and paranoid fascist freaks.

UPDATE: Some have raised a point, one eloquently, on my comments regarding knowing McCain is racist, knowing the same part of the country etc. I just want to emphasize I know the type. I am not implicating everyone. I just know the type who would not be appalled by any of the following, (courtesy of FeastOr)

"I hate the gooks, I will hate them as long as I live.""At least I don’t plaster on the makeup like a trollop, you cunt.""Why is Chelsea Clinton so ugly? Because Janet Reno is her father.""As long as it’s inevitable, you might as well lie back and enjoy it.""..... Now, tell me, where's that fantastic gorilla?"

Montags of the World: Resist!

"That was but a prelude; where they burn books, they will ultimately burn people also."

Apocrophal words of Heinrich Heine (1821) for the 20th, 21st century

On the occasion of the trashing of the Occupy Wall Street Library:"Das war ein Vorspiel nur, dort wo man Bücher verbrennt, verbrennt man auch am Ende Menschen."("That was but a prelude; where they burn books, they will ultimately burn people also.")